I see now that EE 5 is open source, however my web host does not have PHP 7. So I used a previously downloaded core (free) version (3.4.6). However I now notice that you cannot have more than 3 channels with the core version. Is it possible to upgrade the v3 to a paid version since v5 is free? It would make my life easier not having to migrate to a different server.
PHP 5.6 goes end of life in a couple days, so you should be looking at hosting on a server that supports at least 7.1, and preferably 7.3. A web host that doesn’t make this available is not one I’d trust anything I owned with. In addition to staying on a supported version for security, PHP 7.3 is nearly twice as fast as PHP 5.6, which is a humongous, human-noticeable improvement.
That said, ExpressionEngine doesn’t yet require PHP 7+. See “the Bare Minimums”.
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